Should I nuke my linux installation?

Support and Help
1

Ubuntu Version:
24.04 - edubuntu distro

Desktop Environment (if applicable):
I don’t know

Problem Description:
Failing to get docker, open-webui and Ollama to play nicely

Relevant System Information:
PC: AM4 Gigabyte MB: B550M-DS3H-AC, AMD 5800X3D CPU, 6900XT GPU, 32G RAM, Linux running on external 1Tb NVME

I have had this distro up and running for a little over a month. Was using it, alongside my mac mini to take courses at Boot.dev. It was successfully used for much of that. Two weeks ago, attempted to install the combination of open-webui, Ollama and docker to create a container to serve a local LLM to my linux machine. It took some setup, and I paused that and went through several lessons on Boot.dev course on docker. Installed a ton of stuff, including docker desktop, as well as the CLI version. I did a few ‘runs’ at installing these three technologies according to online instructions, and eventually got it to work. Yay!

A few days after that, I saw online a post about how to get Ollama to use my GPU - which I thought was a great idea. Followed the instructions to do that, built an ROCm image for the unsupported (by Docker) AMD GPU, installed all of that and completely broke my working Ollama/webui/docker installation. Didn’t brick the machine, but I tried and tried to find ways to get these three to play nice with my GPU - all to no avail. Eventually gave up, and tried to re-create the solution I had going before : vanilla docker/webui/ollama (non GPU) and … nada. Hard fail, errors, deleting, re-installing, questioning online AI to get help. tons of stuff being downloaded via CLI etc etc. Nothing. It simply will not work. I even got open-webui to show ollama out my 3000 port locally, but there was no option to access or download a model.

I am a complete linux noob, and the way the cli dumps packages all over the system, so that I have no idea whats installed or where is very confusing to me.

Long story short, I feel that by doing all this, I have turned what was a working distro into a brick. So I am likely to try flashing the existing hd with the install image (a complete reformat)> and start again with a clean slate.

All in all, linux has ground me down to pebbles! I have no idea what many of these commands do, and the AI assistants sometimes help, and sometimes screw everything up. I had aspirations of being able to create apps, write code, and host back end servers to those apps, and linux seemed like the definite way to go…before I started actually using it. Now, I don’t know how to proceed.

I saw a note this morning about containers for applications (docker) and containers for entire OS/applications, as compared to virtual machines. This was from an authoritative linux source, but I neglected to bookmark it, and have lost where the actual source was from . It looked like a way to install linux OS into a container, then if that container got to the point I am at now with my linux distro (unusable, broken, and in need of deletion/replacement), that would be a better way to go.

So. My basic ask is this:

Should I go ahead and nuke and restart my linux distro from scratch? Following that I want to get ollama, open-webui and some containerization. Docker seems fairly broken to me: It not only doesn’t support GPU use other than nvidia on WSL – which kinda undoes all the reasons to run linux in the first place (no privacy from microsoft in WSL), it is nearly impossible to setup and run. For me at least. I have spent about 70 hours or so now trying to re-establish how to get Ollama, webui and docker working as a team, and it is a hard fail.

Would love to hear any suggestions on how to do a containerization without docker, or a full virtual machine solution. Anything that will get linux to work.

If you got this far, then bless you! Thanks for taking a look at my journey into this. I will continue to tilt at this windmill, but for now I will wait to see if there are any responses that may guide my journey.

Cheers!

2

Let me first say, I am NOT a developer. I’m just someone who has played with Linux for a number of years and who likes experimenting with things from time to time.

On reading your post, my first reaction is “Rome wasn’t built in a day.” There’s no harm in taking your time over getting familiar with Linux and seeing what it can do, rather than trying to do too much at once.

My personal preference is to use VMs, which I can then blow away if they don’t work, and they don’t mess up my basic install, either.

If you don’t have a lot of data or fancy configurations on your system, and it’s got into a mess, then I see no shame in reinstalling (I did it a few times when I was getting started. But let’s wait and see what other people say first.

3 Likes
3

Fair enough. will hold off till tomorrow. Thx for taking a moment!

4

This is what I see here:

  • great project, nice idea
  • your system specs. would allow you to run virtual machines including heavier loads
  • no shame in reinstalling, we have all been there
  • I think you need to learn some basics about Linux filesystem hierarchy and the commands to find where apps and their config files are stored. It will make things so much easier in the short and long term

My recommendations would be the following:

  • reinstall a fresh version on the drive
  • add a program for virtualization. I personally recommend VirtualBox if you want more control but GNOME Boxes is also perfectly fine for testing
  • create a VM and start testing
  • document what you are doing, what you installed, what went wrong (if relevant) so you can either backtrack and troubleshoot or ask here. You could use a simple text editor with step 1, step 2 etc.

This is a process, it takes time. Yes, it can be frustrating but the rewards are also potentially immense.

Links, which I hope will help:
Install Ubuntu in a VM with VirtualBox
Linux filesystem hierarchy explained
Common commands to list and find files include:

whereis
find
dpkg -L

There are many resources on how to use these commands and you can also use the manpages, for example man whereis

Let us know how else we can help.

Don’t give up, you may have to try and try again but eventually you will succeed and be a better user for it.

2 Likes
5

Thank you for the insightful response. Just spent another two hours trying to fix it. same same. no joy will reinstall tomorrow.

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6

An alternative strategy I decided on way back was to separate my various experiments into physical plugin caddies. Not VM’s. Each caddy containing Ubuntu setup in SSD can be unplugged and a fresh one plugged in. StarTech dual docking bay with SSD’s held in ICY DOCK 2.5" to 3.5" SAS / SATA HDD & SSD Converter (I’m reading from a box coincidentally on my desk). So like a bookshelf of physical books you have physical pluggable ICY DOCK containers for different experiments. Then in your scenario you keep your physical experiment(s), build a fresh platform, plug in old failed experiment into dual docking bay alongside new installation and you can draw upon old files in your screwed up trial. You will need USB 3.0 since Ubuntu will be running external to whatever desktop you use. And I use rEFInd to boot into various real sessions. You can extend this thinking to have several VM’s in a single plugin caddy. Now be warned that this is not the common way to proceed. It is my way. At your own risk. But if you have an emergency you just unplug and grab the caddies and run.
This experimental strategy is handy when playing with multiple AI Agents … and projects which might go into escrow.

P.S. I take your point about dumping all over the place. I offer one more tip. Install Albert, leverage the existing Python plugins (see Settings) AND write your own custom Python script so that you have one stop in driving Ubuntu.
Ctrl+Space … brings up floating query box … then type your command. It is like the 1951 sci-fi Gort interface. "“Klaatu barada nikto”.

Also learn Recoll for indexing and searching. Use it today on your screwed up system to find lost resources. There is an indexing period on first time usage … takes some time to index the entire desktop … or designated folders. It might pull you out of the alligator pit. I have just typed “Docker” into my Recoll query form and I see 22,000 hits. Of course you can narrow down your queries by various search strategies … hover over the Recoll query field to learn the options. For example if I am interested only in Markdown files I use the command … ext:md … which means search files with extension *.md (Markdown). Recoll searches for internal terms not just filepaths.

A few days after that, I saw online a post about how to get Ollama to use my GPU - which I thought was a great idea.

I am at one with you on that. Driving and navigating the Ubuntu desktop Teslar car style. Those are my experiments and can be applied to edubuntu UI. For education sector.

I also just tried “Ollama” in my Recoll tool and found 148 hits so it is described in incoming “intel” flow on AI. Buried away as I research AI.

So you can have a single GUI showing you how to access all assets containing the phrase “Ollama” … and then use the Recoll GUI commands to review/open each hit, by date if you prefer.

Example hit:
New Tutorial: Building a Multimodal Gradio Chatbot with Llama 3.2 Using the Ollama API

In Recoll use the GUI options to review and open content. Lots to learn but Recoll is your “satellite view” on your desktop. Brilliant tool which I integrate into all my workflows. See also Recoll CLI usage … recollq command.

I can offer tips on how to “orchestrate” these sub-systems. That is the way forward. Orchestrating Ubuntu and external resources and AI Agents by simple commands via Albert. As one experiment. CLI klingon language apart.

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7

Ok, I installed edubuntu overtop of my existing installation, nuke and pave. Got to step 1.b in the install virtual box (downloaded an .iso to use, and downloaded virtualbox. The instructions are…kinda gibberish. This is the download and install page. The first page of the tutorial states that “The download page has instructions to install virtual box, so I won’t go into that here”. Unfortunately, these ‘instructions’ are gibberish compared to what my actual setup is: Here is the download page with ‘instructions’ (Hah!). It states " Debian-based Linux distributions

Add the following line to your /etc/apt/sources.list. When I cat that file, it has one commented out line: # Ubuntu sources have moved to /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ubuntu.sources When I cat THAT file, it returns Types: deb
URIs: Index of /ubuntu
Suites: noble noble-updates noble-backports
Components: main restricted universe multiverse
Signed-By: /usr/share/keyrings/ubuntu-archive-keyring.gpg

Types: deb
URIs: Index of /ubuntu
Suites: noble-security
Components: main restricted universe multiverse
Signed-By: /usr/share/keyrings/ubuntu-archive-keyring.gpg

This entire page is basically written in Klingon. It does not refer to virtualbox 7.1 (what I downloaded), but talks about linux oracle, it talks about “to get the latest maintenance release of VirtualBox 7.0.x installed.” (again, I have 7.1) There do not appear to be any instructions about that. It goes on and on about GPG keys for oracle. etc etc etc… To me this is a great first step to completely compromising my newly installed linux distro. I have no confidence in these ‘instructions’ and do not see where anything on that install page has anything relevant to what I downloaded. I am stopped - literally at step 1

8

Let’s take this a different way:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install virtualbox

See if this works and then we can move forward.

You should be able to start it from the Applications menu.

1 Like
9

Ok…installing via apt now. Begs the question: What is the point of the ‘download and install’ page in the tutorial? I don’t understand. I guess I can toss the file I downloaded. … ok it is installed…wish me luck!

10

Hmmm. Making progress: slow but sure. am at the unattended Guest OS install Setup page…username: check, password: check. Guest additions/iso (the only iso on my machine is the one I loaded on the previous screen): check. Install in Bavkground:check. Back: Next: Cancel buttons: Next is greyed out. Toggling Guest Addition off or on does nothing. Stopped at this step.

11

Got it sorted. Installing now. Thanks so much for all the help and suggestions!! Wish me luck!

1 Like
12

Great news, good luck!

13

Hello - me again. Trying to find the extension pack for VB and the only sources I can find (from oracle) are linked to 'error 502 bad gateway. I searched for a mirror for the VB extensions, no joy. I found a github repo that seemed relevant. Navigated to vbox/include/VBox/ExtPack/ExtPack.h at master · mirror/vbox · GitHub and downloaded the file. VB does not recognize it (when I attempt to install it, pointing at my download file, VB shows no extension package files). I need this to enable bi-directional clipboards. Any thoughts on where I may get my hands on this extensions file? (7.0.162802 for VB).

ADVthanksANCE if you know where to get this magic file!

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14

Ar you searching for VirtualBox_Extension_Pack-7.0.16.vbox-extpack? Found at Virtualbox old builds.

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15

That was it, thanks. I kept getting 502 errors (even on the link you provided)…switched to my mac. Downloaded it. emailed it to myself. Retrieved it in linux, installed it into the VirtualBox. It took.

Restarted the Virtual box, made sure bi-directional clipboard was enabled (why I wanted the extension pack). It is enabled…yet, it will not allow paste from host, nor will it paste TO the host. So, kinda the opposite of bidirectional clipboard - NO directional clipboard!

So far this virtual box machine has not been able to achieve any goal I have set for it. I could not get open-webui installed, as the instructions on how to do so using python3 and uv did not work.

The entire point of virtual box was to avoid docker.

So, I am still completely stuck trying to get linux to, well, do anything.